A middle-aged man dreaming of the day when he can stop begging for scraps and write for a living.

Wednesday, September 19, 2007

Bill to Restore Habeas Corpus Failed. Yet...

This evening I wrote yet another letter to Senator Ken Salazar (D-CO).

As I've vented much spleen over your voting record this session, I thought I'd take the time to praise your vote in the matter of restoring Habeus Corpus. Although the bill was defeated (with help from your Republican counterpart, Senator Allard), you did the right thing by voting for it.

I want to urge you to encourage the Senate to submit that bill again, unchanged, over and over again until the media starts asking why so many our nation's leaders feel that Habeus Corpus deserves the gruesome death it was given in 2006. This is the sort of thing Congress should be doing when a bill is defeated or vetoed: keep resubmitting it, possibly with even more stringent requirements than before. We do NOT accept the lack of a supermajority as an excuse for failure. You can use that to your advantage, by bringing attention to what you're trying to do and why your political opponents are stopping it.

Remember the mandate given to you in the 2006 elections: you were given the majority in both the House and the Senate because the American public isn't buying into the White House's propaganda anymore. The Beltway pundits are more disconnected from American thinking than any other time in history. Their power is waning, and you need to encourage your fellow Senators to do what is right, not what is expedient.

Do NOT wait for the 2008 elections before you fix the damage the Bush administration has done. Do NOT make the excuse that the Republicans and Blue Dog Democrats are blocking progress. Keep voting the way you just have and keep re-submitting bills designed to restore the rule of law and bring our troops home. Congress looks incredibly weak, but you have an opportunity to change that. I hope you take it.

Update:Denis Bider corrected me on the spelling of "habeas" rather than "habeus." It has been updated in the title, but not the letter since that's actually how I wrote it to Senator Salazar. Thank you, Denis.